Attacks on Indians in Australia: racist or recessionist?
A spate of attacks on Indian students in Melbourne and Sydney has seen the Indian media accuse Australia of being a racist nation.
Newspaper articles warning of a culture of “curry bashings” in Australia have sparked off debate and people around the world have spoken out against the attacks in online forums.
Some insist the majority of attacks may have been purely criminal.
As an Indian studying in the U.S. for the past three years, I am yet to come across any instance of Indians being targeted on the basis of their race.
I have never heard my American friends say anything against Indians or students of any other nationality.
Does that mean Indians are safer in New York than in Melbourne?
The attacks on Indians did take place in Australia, but then they could have happened anywhere.
Are frequent elections a waste of time and money?
The general elections in India, due shortly, may not throw up a clear winner.
This could mean weeks or even months of political uncertainty as parties negotiate for power.
Of the past six prime ministers, only three could complete their term.
In this context, the idea for a fixed term for parliament or the government may be floated again.
Indeed, the Chief Election Commissioner recently suggested a fixed term of five years for the government to cope with the increased frequency of elections, which hinders governance.
One reason for such suggestions is that frequent elections are seen as wasteful.
A candidate in a large state is allowed to spend around 2.5 million rupees (US $50,000) to contest for the lower house of parliament in a large state.
Wow it’s nice to see there is no one with the general pessimistic thought. Oh elections, netas, corruption!!!
We are a democracy, slow to work or no, expensive to stay so or no, we must remain a democracy.
Play safe, stay away from stocks
The world of equities seems to have opted for a bargain-basement sale. The BSE Sensex which scaled the dizzy heights of 21,000 points in January 2008 is today testing 10,000 and nobody is sure if the bottom has been found.
“Nowhere in the world are we close to a bottom. Put your money in a safe bank at 9 pct and forget about the stock market for the next two years,” Shankar Sharma, Joint Managing Director of First Global, told Reuters.
If that’s the case, one wonders if the response pattern will change to the Reuters Money question – Where do you see the Sensex by Diwali??
High-profile equities investor Rakesh Jhunjhunwala who had advised Indian investors to keep away from the stock markets as early as November 2007 declined comment on the current situation.
The Indian stock markets have been on a downward spiral for the past 8 months and more and bellwether stocks like Reliance Industries, ICICI, Infosys have taken a serious hammering at the bourses. Some equities analysts do see this as a good opportunity to buy and build a good portfolio for the future.
British economist John Maynard Keynes who said “in the long run, we’re all dead” be damned.
But, there again, some of the “experts” were advising investors to buy at every level of the tumble – 18,000, 16,000, 14,000, 12,000 and now near 10,000.
Recession is the buzzword today.I happened to visit a website “seechangeworld.com”. They talk something new , “RECESSIONOMICS”. They have come out with a novel product online – “Recession Proofing your Business” .Please visit http://seechangeworld.in/Recession_Proof .html
1. Australia is one from the less racist countries in the world, from the most opened and tolerant countries in the world.
2. The terrorist attacks in New York increased the xenophobia and they racist attacks not only against Muslims but against Jews, Sighs and other foreigners.
3. The rapid change of the synthesis of Australian population, only 35% of Australians said that they come from English ancestors ( 2006 census) and less than 18% of Australians are Anglicans created worries to extreme nationalists.
4. The international financial crisis increased the unemployment and local labors saw that they lost their job not only of cause the financial crisis but because migrants work harder for less money and worst conditions and they took the jobs.
5. last years the number of foreign students increased rapidly , hundred of thousands of foreign students, while the government has allowed them to work many hours per semester. Foreign students work with very low wages in very bad conditions and of cause the financial crisis they have created huge problems to local unskilled, low income labors. It is the unskilled, non educated people who become racists and attack the students or migrants.
6. For these reasons and much more has created a dangerous combination of conditions which expressed not only with racist attacks but with many other ways, including the increase of criminal attacks.
7. There are many studies mainly from Western Sydney University and from Australian National University about the race discrimination in Australia and especially in NSW, Victoria and Queensland. We know from these studies that the race discrimination exist and for some ethnic groups as Lebanese in Sydney or Muslims or Asians is very high, higher than the race discrimination against blacks in USA .
8. Unfortunately, Australian governments, Federal or states, Liberal or ALP instead to try to support the victims of race discrimination, instead to try to minimize the race discrimination they try to limit migrant’s role in Australia. The attacks against multiculturalism from federal governments, Liberal and ALP, the citizenship test are sound proves.
9. There is a study from the Western Sydney University about the attacks against Muslims, you can find it in a report of the Australian Human Rights Commission, from this study we learned that more than 90% of attacks against Muslims comes from Anglos, although they are less than 35% of the population, according to 2006 census.
10. Without doubt most racist attacks comes from extrem nationalists, white supremacists etc.
11. Unfortunately many migrants or foreign students do not trust the police and they do not report the attacks at all or on time, this is not helpful at all, we can not expect from the police to stop the attacks when we do not inform them for the attacks.
Antonios Symeonakis
Adelaide